Fri. 5/9/14 8:42am
Doug Schulkind:
Glad you're here Brian, duke and Listener James. It feels good to be surrounded by WFMU family just now.

Fri. 5/9/14 8:54am
listener james from westwood:
Would occasionally see him at 00's FMU record fairs, too, still on the hunt for good tunes.

Fri. 5/9/14 8:56am
listener james from westwood:
We're here with you, Doug. Hell, I still think of good ol' Raymond Franks whenever I hear "Comme à la radio." Heard it twice this week on the station. Still sad not to have him.

Fri. 5/9/14 8:56am
Doug Schulkind:
WFMU is WFMU because of people like Rix.

Fri. 5/9/14 8:58am
Doug Schulkind:
Last time I saw Ray Franks, James, was in his motorman's compartment on the F train he was driving in the NYC subway. This was a few years after he'd left the airwaves.

Fri. 5/9/14 9:26am
Holly in NC:
Oh! Today's birthday:
"On May 9, 1960, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved what would soon become the first birth control pill produced for commercial use. The drug was manufactured by the G.D. Searle Company in Chicago, Illinois. Its official moniker was Enovid-10, but it would forever be known simply as “The Pill.” "

Fri. 5/9/14 9:31am
bobdc:
Hi Doug--your talkover music reminds me that a local bar here in Charlottesville has a poster for Fellini's "The Clowns," and you can see a copy at fffmovieposters.com... . Best part: the blurb from Seventeen Magazine calling it "Picture of the month!"

@ bobdc -- Please notify the person I was supposed to provide something for today and the person I was supposed to meet for lunch that you sent me to a movie poster site....and well, bada-binge bada-browse...

Fri. 5/9/14 9:46am
Doug Schulkind:
The Goody Oswaldo track up next is from the record Rix gave me as a gift.

Hello radio brother Gary!

Fri. 5/9/14 9:47am
?:
Very nice tribute Doug. The link to Bob’s reminiscence of the his early days brought back memories to me as well trying to tune the station in from Monmouth County and later from the palisades of Weehawken. Of Naruki, Vanilla Bean, Jim Price, Frank and Irwin’s shows and RSM. And Bud Styple – hadn’t thought of him in some time.

Fri. 5/9/14 9:47am
earrie:
Thanks for sharing your thoughts and memories of Rix, Doug. And to share some of your memories through music, too. My hat is off.

Fri. 5/9/14 9:49am
Doug Schulkind:
Thanks ? and earrie. There is no place I'd rather be than amongst the likes of you.

Fri. 5/9/14 9:49am
Michael:
I guess I wasn't signed in above. No wonder it asked for the math!

Fri. 5/9/14 9:50am
Doug Schulkind:
John Narucki and Bud Styple were just slightly before my time at WFMU. (Maybe a good thing, considering Narucki's attachment to handguns.) Both were FMU legends then (in '87) and the remain legends today. Just like Rix.

Fri. 5/9/14 9:52am
Doug Schulkind:
Thanks to listener holland oats for sending out to search for this Ricardo Marrero LP!

Fri. 5/9/14 9:53am
listener james from westwood:
Sweet fancy Moses, one of the few things I love more than a highlife set is a Latin set. Killin' it, Doug!!

Fri. 5/9/14 9:54am
listener james from westwood:
("Latin" not meant to be any sort of limit on the possibly wildly different origins of the actual artists, BTW.)

Fri. 5/9/14 9:59am
Doug Schulkind:
@Gary
Yes indeed he was. Rix was (as I'm sure you will appreciate) a poet first and a DJ a close second. He got the word out. When his DJing waned, his blogging waxed.

Fri. 5/9/14 9:59am
Holly in NC:
lord, sometimes I think EVERY song should incorporate cowbell.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:01am
Doug Schulkind:
Hate to break this to you, Holly, but I think that was an elephant bell.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:01am
ndbob:
Hmm - after looking at the headline of his first post there , I certainly have no desire to read more

Fri. 5/9/14 10:10am
Gary:
Here's some of his videos on his YouTube page: www.youtube.com... ... will have to check out after the show

Fri. 5/9/14 10:12am
Cecile:
So a question.
What album or band were you turned off by the performer's image or bad press and now love?

For me, it was South of Heaven by Slayer. Satanists usually make for bad music, and I am still Catholic enough to be creeped out by pentagrams. Then I found out the band is composed of both practicing Catholics and atheists. Then I got it and am enjoying this album immensely.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:16am
listener james from westwood:
Jesus. pneumonia. Killed a 43-y.o. friend of mine. Killed that singer in Broadcast at 42. Killed Jim Henson in his 50s. So tempted to get the pneumonia shot, and I'm 44.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:16am
Holly in NC:
Holy sh*t! From a different room (brushing teeth) I thought this (the Balls) was the Handsome Family, which is cool because the Handsome Family have indeed covered the Balls - a SUPERLATIVE version of Jenny Jenkins.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:16am
Webhamster Henry:
Nice picture of Rix.. I hope he was not cracking peanuts.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:17am
Gary:
@Cecile: M.I.A., though I don't really love her now. But someone at the EMP pop conference a couple of weeks ago played something of hers and I really responded to it (and to the talk during which it was played).

Fri. 5/9/14 10:18am
Cecile:
cool, Gary! I'm still on the fence with her.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:18am
Doug Schulkind:
@Cecile
As a young man, I had a huge bias against pretty much all white southern music. Growing up, to me the southern accent was the accent of George Wallace and Bull Connor. Took a lot to get me to shake off my pathetic smallmindedness.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:21am
Doug Schulkind:
@Cecile
Imagine my shock and delight when, quite a few years ago now, a newspaper in New Jersey called my radio show one of the best "country" radio shows in the state. Ridiculous, of course, but I appreciated the sentiment.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:24am
Holly in NC:
@Ceceile - I begrudgingly like a number of songs on the latest Deerhunter lp.

Unfortunately my problem goes the other way - much of the music I adore is made by complete assholes, sometimes so much that it's really hard to justify my adoration of the music. Head often close to exploding ;-)

Fri. 5/9/14 10:24am
listener james from westwood:
My mom had walking pneumonia as a young-ish woman. Took her 6 weeks to shake. The cigs didn't help, but still.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:28am
Michael:
I think that NJ newspaper is right Doug. Great stuff!

Fri. 5/9/14 10:28am
Cecile:
My husband had something similar and ended up with a swollen big toe! It was such a weird and annoying summer last year.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:29am
ndbob:
@Holly same here - but you just half to separate that - I know someone who posted this vile, disgusting anti-Obama joke - and I called him on it - turned out he had gotten it from someone who made a great rockabilly record - he was shocked when i told him i would still listen to it.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:32am
Cecile:
I think you can do it to a point.
But there are some things I will not touch.
I don't care how great some racist skinhead oi music might be, but I will never buy or support it.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:32am
Cecile:
I had a real problem with people listening to Skrewdriver ironically

Fri. 5/9/14 10:36am
listener james from westwood:
I can't think of any artists/acts where I've had that sort of change of heart. Once I relegate a hate-filled or a loathsome act or artist, I forget them, I guess. Kinda like Adblock on Firefox.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:40am
Doug Schulkind:
You had to Gary, or she'd stop listening to your show!

I am really horrible at separating the art from the artist thing. I hold grudges against artists that do and say and represent things I find reprehensible.

I try to fight against that bias, though. I kind handle it the way I think the Baseball Hall of Fame should handle Pete Rose. Stick his ass in the Hall of Fame, but put in his plaque in big letters that he was a cheating motherfucker.

I will play the music of musicians with whom I disagree, but I will tell you that they are assholes while I spin their records.

Hi davex!!

Fri. 5/9/14 10:41am
Doug Schulkind:
The sax player here with Jeanne Lee is C Sharpe. (The C is for Clarence.)

Fri. 5/9/14 10:41am
davex:
Agree about Pete Rose - the Hall is full of even less savory personalities. Nobody cared (much) back in the day.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:42am
Diane:
Jeanne Lee is so good!! And this piece is a real treat.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:46am
Alex In Illinois:
Speaking of great music from human beings who are not so great at other things, I remember on the Sound Opinions forum, someone attacking John Lennon for divorcing his first wife and being a bad father. But then someone else responded by pointing out the Mick Jagger and Sting are not exactly candidates for any "good parent" awards. What about Ike Turner? He sort of invented Rock & Roll, he made a lot of good music but he was a wife-beating jerk. Then Phil Specter, etc. There is something on WFMU's site about Don McLean being a jerk too. Leadbelly had to go to prison multiple times for stabbing people. Sometimes I think of songs and peices of music as life forms that are floating in their own dimension, but then need human beings as mediums to be converted to something that we can hear, and often can't consider a human's faults when choosing someone to be their gateway.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:48am
Cecile:
I take people's faults into consideration. I understand that music might be the only good offering from a bad person, but at least they are offering it up.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:54am
Brian in UK:
Do you buy music for any moral standpoint. People made the mistake of thinking that Bob Dylan was some kind of protest leader, naive and of the times. If it moves you then do not get precious about it.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:54am
Alex In Illinois:
Don't proto-fascist bands have proto-fascist lyrics, and actual proto-fascist intentions with their music? That clearly makes them something that I am unlikely to enjoy or value.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:55am
pacific standard simon:
Orson Scott Card, and that idiot who wrote and drew Cerebus The Aardvark, poisoned their own wells for me years ago. Hi gang -- might be awake soon.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:56am
Brian in UK:
By the way that is SIR Mick Jagger a frigging misnomer if ever there was one.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:56am
Doug Schulkind:
Here's a for instance: In the early 1990s, I was in a record store pouring over a bin of South African records. A fellow noticed me doing this and we got into a long conversation about South African music. It turns out this guy was a South African who was working in the ANC's office at the United Nations. He found it curious that a person such as myself would be interested in South African music and he was surprised by my level of knowledge about it. One thing I didn't know, and that this gentleman told me about, was that the group Ladysmith Mambazo, the 7-Up hawking vocal group that Paul Simon sang with on Saturday Night Live, was a tool of the Apartheid government. Despite the fact that Joseph Shabalala and the group had been asked to refrain from doing so by numerous black SA organizations (including the ANC), it continued to perform at Apartheid government functions and ceremonies. One could say that they were just earning a paycheck (kinda like Ray Charles singing the National Anthem at the Republican National Convention), but this was just totally unacceptable.

I have never played Ladysmith Black Mambazo on my show since.

Fuck them.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:57am
Andrew Waterloo:
Yah.. I used hang out with a guy who was a huge fan of Cerebus and David Sims and was constantly obsessing over his essays. Doesn't help that David Sims is local.

Fri. 5/9/14 10:59am
Doug Schulkind:
By the way, Nina Simone is about to cut our your heart and feed it to you. Fair warning.

Fri. 5/9/14 11:00am
Cecile:
Yes, Alex.
But people were in love with the fact Skrewdriver wrote viciously catchy songs, and would look past a lot for a catchy tune. Which was kind of their point any way.

PSSimon, Cerebus was great for about 2 years, and then Sim believed his own hype. I read Orson Scott Card's first short story (in the same collection as the brilliant "The Ugly Chickens" by Howard Waldrop, and the magnificent "The Way of Cross and Dragon" by George RR Martin. It was stodgy, moralistic and predictable, even though it was beautifully written. I have continued reading the other authors (Waldrop more so than Martin) but have never regretted a moment not reading any more Card works.

Fri. 5/9/14 11:01am
Cecile:
And if you have to read funny animal comics, the beautfiul Usagi Yojimbo is a fine place to start and end.

Fri. 5/9/14 11:01am
Doug Schulkind:
Glad (but not at all surprised that) you like it, Van!

Fri. 5/9/14 11:01am
davex:
Tough topic, actually. I only need to think of Wagner and how people choose to deal with his legacy, always a tight-rope act.

Fri. 5/9/14 11:02am
Gary:
@Doug: By far the most thrilling talk at EMP was by this guy from South Africa on Capital Radio 604: www.capital604.com... ... he's apparently writing a book, which I can't wait to read (someday, when it's out)

Fri. 5/9/14 11:03am
Alex In Illinois:
@Cecile:
I will have to confess ignorance of Screwdriver. But I do agree with you on that. Any group that does that and has people eating it up like that is even more insidious and disturbing.

Fri. 5/9/14 11:03am
davex:
Hey Brian! Yes, spring has sprung, even on Wagner's birthplace - now a spanking new mall!

Fri. 5/9/14 11:08am
Van in DC:
The best thing about Cerebus was the artwork by "Gerhard" whoever that was. Just phenomenal artwork. And Cecil - I don't remember the currency issues...I guess I came in late for that

Fri. 5/9/14 11:09am
Alex In Illinois:
To me, Cerebus, is a 2 headed dog guarding the gates of Hades, from Greek mythology. As you can all see now, there are certain parts of popular culture that I have not been in on. There are other parts of popular culture of which I WHICH I were ignorant.

Fri. 5/9/14 11:11am
Brian in UK:
Davex I would not know what to do with a pot of gold it would scare me to death. It went right from one end of the sky to the other. Set me up for the day and put a smile on my face.

Fri. 5/9/14 11:12am
still b/p:
@ davex -- I believe it was you and I talking a year ago about our mutual friend and his Summer King opera. That thing was put on here in town last night -- not a full staging but still a large production in a major local venue. A mammoth undertaking, a large appreciative crowd and from all appearances, quite a success.

Fri. 5/9/14 11:13am
Brian in UK:
@Alex Hades used to be a nightclub called Shades 'till the 'S' fell off, then the trouble started.

Fri. 5/9/14 11:14am
Andrew Waterloo:
What I gathered from my friend Cerebus was the general fantasy of the man-boy who reads Anne Coulter and thinks the world was ruined by liberals, feminists, and lawyers.

Fri. 5/9/14 11:15am
Alex In Illinois:
@Van: You're right. I was reading the string "Cerebus" as "Cerberus". You know that phenomonon where you can still recognize words even with letters missing or re-arranged?

Fri. 5/9/14 11:23am
ndbob:
@Ceclie Not sure - I searched on The Ugly Chickens and found out that it was Nebula Award Winner and had been collected in 1980 - haven't found a Table of Contents yet though

Fri. 5/9/14 11:48am
Carmichael:
I love the smell of napalm in the morning.

Fri. 5/9/14 11:50am
Brian in UK:
Doug, that is a wonderful photograph. Great show.

Fri. 5/9/14 11:50am
pacific standard simon:
Yesterday, I was training a new (female) employee when Tex Williams' "Never Trust A Woman" came on my music player. I grinned and said, "Well... that's embarrassing."

Fri. 5/9/14 11:51am
Uncle Michael:
This is a hilariously tragic lyric. It's right up there with Kung Fu Christmas.